HISD student information 'at your fingertips'

Billy Dragoo

Published 7:00 pm, Thursday, August 30, 2001

Hill has developed a program which allows school personnel to monitor the comings and goings of students with the Palm Pilots. And the program is being expanded to allow parents to also monitor their child's progress in school.

"I built a program that allows us to take the schedule for each respective campus and actually track each student," Hill said. "It will tell the principal exactly where the student is supposed to be at what time and the room number and the teacher. That's exactly what we're using it for."

Hill said the purpose of the program is to give principals instant access to information about a student.

"Sometimes, if a student comes into the halls during classtime or is trying to slip out of class, the principal has the information in their hand. They don't have to run back to the office or the counselor's office, they can look up the information right there. In the past, they had to go all the way back to the office or the counselor's office to get information about a student. Now they can get that student right back into the classroom without them missing their education. And that's the key to this whole thing - keeping them in the classroom.

"Another example. We've got a new pre-K kid that comes along the first two weeks of school at the elementary. He doesn't know the teacher, he's not familiar with the environment, he doesn't know which way to go. The principal can find out the student's name, punch it in to the Palm Pilot and it pulls up his entire schedule, his room number and the teacher's name. The principal can just guide the student on into the classroom and that helps out tremendously."

Hill said he thinks the Hempstead ISD is breaking ground with the use of the Palm Pilots.

"I don't see any other schools using it at this time," he said. "A couple of schools in Austin saw the program I was working on and wanted me to develop it for them also. They are planning on going that way, too."

Hill said Skyward/School Assist has an application that does the same type of thing with the Palm Pilots, but the application was not ready for the market.

"I couldn't wait," he said. "So, I developed it myself."

Hill said the information in the Palm Pilots is simply downloaded from a computer.

"If a schedule is ready to be downloaded, a principal can put his Palm Pilot on its cradle, push a button and it downloads the schedule into the Palm Pilot.

HISD principals are excited about the new innovation, according to Hill.

"They just love it." School has been back in session only for a few days, but the system is "working real well. The principals are able to get the students to where they are supposed to be very quickly, especially the new students. The principals are excited to be able to track their students and have the information right there in their hands."

Another part of the program that Hill is still working on will allow principals to review student's grades, schedule changes, or telephone numbers with the Palm Pilot. Instant access to information on each student "and that's why we believe in technology, so that we can have that information that quickly so we can be prepared.

"This is just part of the technology that we are doing here in Hempstead," Hill said. "The next part, now that we have it, is to get the parents involved. We want to increase the relationship with the parents by letting them see the date that we keep on their child. We now have a program that allows a parent to go to a computer on any campus, type in their user name and password and they will be able to pull up their student's grades, discipline, attendance, schedule - the whole works. So if we sent six-week report cards home and the parent doesn't get it, the parent will call up the school. Now, we have the technology in place where if that report card doesn't make it home, a parent can either come up to school or if they have access to the internet, they can dial up our home page and look at their child's records. And that makes the parents feel they are a part of the education system and they should be."

Hill was selected to participate in a video for the Intel "Teach to the Future" Program.

The five minute intro video supports the Intel Teach to the Future program http://www.intel.com/education/teach/teach.htm, an in-depth teacher-training program with a goal of training 400,000 teachers worldwide through 2002. That is one of the Intel Innovation in Education initiatives.

In addition, it will serve as a communication vehicle for the US Intel Teach program.

Initially, it was used at the American Legislative Council on Aug. 1 in New York City where it acted as the opener to Intel's presentation.

Hill was also selected to participate as the Master Teacher in Technology for the state of Texas for the Intel program at the NECC Conference in Chicago, Ill. in June 2001.